Beelzebub 1,269

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Quite a challenge this week, and browsing the list of answers, it’s not hard to see why.

I made good steady progress at first, filling about two thirds of the grid unaided. A couple more sittings yielded a few non-committal pencil marks but nothing more. Come blogging day, it was time to fire up the SRA (Small Red App) and do my best at explaining what I could.

I’ve failed in places, of course, so clues are reproduced in case others did better than me!

*=anagram, []=dropped, <=reversed.

Across
1 AUTARCHIC – A + RATUR< + CHIC.
9 HERS – HE[a]RS.
13 KRISHNA – (IS + H[indus]) in RANK*.
14 FRET – RE in FT.
15 MENSAL – MEN + SAL.
16 ENTREE – Perhaps a double definition: Main / means of access.
17 EASY GAME – SEA* + [finall]Y + GAME. “Game” can indeed mean “lame” apparently.
19 LOITERER – LO + (IT in (ER repeatedly)).
20 SOLIDUNGULOUS – (LID + GNU<) in (SOUL + OUS[t]).
22 HETAIRIA – THE* + (I in ARIA).
26 OPERETTA – (NO REPEAT)*.
27 VENDOR – END in VOR.
28 CAIMAN – I in CAMAN. A “caman” is apprently a shinty stick.
29 IRON – I + R + O + [galleo]N.
30 OUT-TAKE – U in (OTT + AKE).
31 KYNE – [muc]KY NE[eeding].
32 MONKEY NUT – (N + KEY) in (MON + UT).
Down
2 UREAL – U[n]REAL.
3 TINSEL – Gaudy stuff, paltry, mostly a disappointment.
4 ASSYRIAN – ASS + AIRY< + N.
5 RHAGADIFORM – (H + FOR DIAGRAM)*.
6 HARMONIPHON – HARM + ON + I + P + H[e] + ON.
7 IDEE – [n]EEDI[ng]<.
8 CONSTUPRATE – (PUT ANCESTOR)*
10 ERROR – E + (0 in RRR).
11 REEVE – RE[li]EVE.
12 STEERSMAN – (SNARES + MEN)*.
15 MENSHEVIK – MEN + (V in SHEIK).
18 VELLEITY – LEVEL* + IT + [dogberr]Y. Nothing to do with Shakespeare, this is “will” as in “volition”.
21 OUTMAN – OU + T[ea]M + AN.
23 EVERY – E[ducation] + VERY.
24 TENON – TENO[r] + N.
25 OTAKU – Mostly upset Japanese nerds.
26 ORZO – [b]ORZO[i].

 

5 comments on “Beelzebub 1,269”

  1. Hi Simon

    You have it right for entrée.
    For tinsel, I took paltry to be tin (as in tinny) and sell as the (full) disappointment.
    I am sure I parsed otaku before entering it, but can’t now remember how. I’ll get back if it comes back.

    Thanks to S&B.

  2. My version has ‘British fragment’ in front of what you’ve quoted as 25d, as did the proof I saw. I think the addition should help…annoying it doesn’t seem to have made it to the printed page.

  3. If it did start with ‘British fragment’ that explains how I was able to parse it, so perhaps it did?

  4. Aha. My copy didn’t have that, so I feel a little better about failing to understand. I managed to solve it anyway, heaven knows where I picked up that word though!

  5. I was away yesterday, so I didn’t have me copy of last week’s paper to hand. Definitely didn’t have “British fragment”. I think I solved it by searching Chambers, in the end.

    The two I failed to parse were 20ac and 32ac, so thanks for that. Was looking at “Monut” for the Burmese people!

    My memory is that I filled in the grid quickly (for a Beelzebub) but there were many where it took me ages to parse the answers once I’d got them.

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